Chosen by the Alien Hybrids

by Lia Nox

  Chosen by the Alien Hybrids

  The Lost Arena: Book 2

  Lia Nox

  Contents

  Erin

  Erin

  Roth

  Erin

  Kern

  Erin

  Roth

  Erin

  Talos

  Erin

  Talos

  Kern

  Erin

  Roth

  Erin

  Talos

  Erin

  Kern

  Erin

  Roth

  Erin

  Roth

  Talos

  Kern

  Erin

  Roth

  Erin

  Talos

  Erin

  Kern

  Erin

  Roth

  Talos

  Kern

  Erin

  Roth

  Erin

  Talos

  Erin

  Kern

  Erin

  Talos

  Erin

  Kern

  Erin

  Roth

  Talos

  Kern

  Erin

  Roth

  Erin

  Talos

  Kern

  Erin

  Thank you for reading!

  Tested by the Alien Hybrids: Sneak Peek!

  Erin

  “Come on, Mouse,” I muttered to myself. “Let’s see if we can manage one more day of not dying.” I dragged the last of the day’s haul to the edge of my new home.

  Home.

  That was a laugh.

  There wasn’t much. A slightly bent pole. Thin metal sheets I’d found scattered across the sand.

  Foil packets stamped in a language I couldn’t read.

  And so much sand.

  It got into everything. Into the pod, around the crazily leaning walls I’d tried to hammer into the sand itself. In my clothes and my eyes, until all I wanted to do was scream.

  “Just keep moving.”

  Because if I was moving, I didn’t have to think about it. About anything. About here, about the sand, about the endless dunes that maybe weren’t so endless.

  But I was too scared to find out.

  Days ago I’d been running, my feet slapping against the dirty asphalt while my heart thumped with the adrenaline pumping through my body.

  “Oh,” I moaned to myself as I remembered where it’d all gone wrong.

  I’d been reckless and stupid, consumed by greed. Now, as my punishment, I’d been the one betrayed. I’d been thrown into the abyss of the universe in an experiment that had no hopes of working.

  Except it had.

  And that had been days ago.

  Here’s not that much better, I grumbled. At least it’s not a cell.

  Even if I’d been thrown through a wormhole, crash landed on an alien planet and left to die. I really sucked at trying to cheer myself up.

  I touched the sore spot on my forehead gingerly. The slight cut had been my only real injury from the crash. When the side of the pod had opened, I’d stumbled out into the dying light and seen nothing but empty sand all around me.

  Alone.

  The strange feeling was almost as frightening as realizing what had been done to me.

  Where I was.

  Terrified, I’d pulled back inside the pod, and spent my first night on this world huddled against the wall, eyes focused on the opening for an attack.

  But nothing came.

  The next morning, aware of how desperately I needed to get a basic understanding of my environment, I’d clambered out of my broken pod, the eggshell crack running around its body a stark reminder of what I’d survived.

  A bump on the head and some minor bruising was a godsend, or so I hoped—if I was stuck somewhere without food, water, and shelter, my gash would soon pale in comparison to the list of problems I was totting up.

  Mindful of my injury, I tentatively fingered at the damaged skin, automatically wincing the moment I pressed a little too hard. Hell, it hurt! I’d need something to cover it up or at the very least to clean it; if it remained open and dirty, exposed to whatever random alien microbes, I dreaded to think how ill I’d become.

  With the growing light, the world that started to come into view was still a bleak looking one: it looked like I was near the outskirts of a type of desert landscape.

  The air was gritty with dust, lightly coating my tongue. I didn’t like it here. And it didn’t really matter, not if I was going to survive.

  My only other option was submitting to death. And while I knew that my demise might give many a reason to cheer, I didn’t want to give anyone the satisfaction.

  Armed with a minimally renewed sense of purpose—to make it through the next couple of hours—I cleaned around my wound with the tattered sleeve of my clothes. It stung worse than a hornet, the dull throb increasing with every stroke.

  Contented that I’d be able to keep infection at bay for longer than first thought, I ventured off in search of. . .anything. I needed every single supply imaginable, but I’d be happy to find a half moldy piece of fruit!

  To my surprise, it didn’t take long before the world started to right itself—after my initial worries, which were still niggling away at me, my proficiency in scavenging was now coming to my rescue.

  I never wandered too far from the pod, both out of fear and comfort: as damaged as it was, as much of a harbinger of bad memories as it might be, it was a confined space I knew well.

  Before long, I amassed several useful items, many of which had been strewn across the dunes as if a mass evacuation had happened. I’d also gotten the distinct impression that others had passed through not too long before myself, though there was no sign of them now.

  Today’s score included more of the foil packets, which I eagerly ripped open. Driven by hunger, and worse, the thirst that made every dusty, sandy breath agony, I’d tentatively opened one earlier.

  It smelled awful.

  It tasted worse.

  But so far, it hadn’t made me sick.

  I picked over my small stash of half eaten food packages written in a language I didn’t recognize, a half mangled contraption that might be a weapon, and a metal box filled with what might be medical supplies. Bandages appeared to be a galactic constant. I wasn’t so sure about the rest of the vials.

  There’d been much more for me to take, but my old habit of ripping open tech and stripping it for parts had seemed redundant. My skills might help me survive, but they’d be good for little else, not unless a vendor was hiding somewhere nearby.

  I licked and dipped one of my fingers into the open food packet, anxious of what might come out of it, but as I went to examine the brown goop, a noise made me stop mid taste. My ears strained for it to come again, but all was silent now, and so I returned to my unappetizing looking meal.

  Open mouthed, I flicked my tongue out to lap at it when the racket of crashing limbs sounded from all sides of me. Twisting to see what was gaining on my position, I spotted not one, not two, but over five creatures narrowing in on me.

  I was surrounded.

  Don’t move.

  It had worked in the past. I’d always frozen, so still that scavengers from enemy gangs would look right past me. It worked, and had given me my name. Mouse.

  This time, I wasn’t so lucky.

  The monsters could smell me. And they didn’t want the spoiled food back.

  I was to be their next meal.

  One of the nearest of the group spread wide its fanged snout, its jagged, yellowing teeth the ugliest thing on the planet so far, second only to the smell that wafted from its mouth.

  I gagged back
bile, my skin turning clammy and hot as I stared into its blank, emotionless black eyes.

  It couldn’t be reasoned with, and there was no way it was going to let me go. I grabbed the damaged weapon from my stash and aimed it at them.

  Click.

  Maybe it was broken. Maybe I wasn’t handling it correctly. Maybe it wasn’t a weapon after all.

  It didn’t matter.

  With a scream, I threw it at the closest of the monsters. And finally, I had a bit of luck. The sharp edge of the weapon crashed into its forehead, knocking it back a half-step, right into the side of its packmate.

  Who promptly attacked it.

  Whatever the hell these things were, they were ready to fight anything, even each other.

  As the pair of them screeched with rage and pain, I bolted, leaving all of my stolen belongings behind. I had no idea where I was going, scrambling down the side of one dune, quickly leaving behind the small area I’d scouted. I’d been too afraid to venture far from the pod.

  Another of my many mistakes.

  A strangled, pitiful whimper came from my dry throat as I thrashed about in the undergrowth, the desert transitioning into thin, long curled grasses that grew in dense clumps.

  In another life, I’d have stopped to take it all in, but now my sole aim was not dying.

  More roars came from behind me. The monsters had finished fighting each other.

  But they hadn’t forgotten about me.

  Erin

  “No dying today, Mouse, remember?”

  My lungs burned, chest wheezing as I tried to catch my breath. This was a bad sign.

  If those mauling things caught up with me, I’d be ripped apart, piece by piece; the only comfort I could take from that image was that at least it would be somewhere beautiful. The desert I’d crash landed in had been underwhelming to look at: a sea of reds and oranges, the fine grains of the dirt clinging to everything it touched.

  I should have explored more in the other direction.

  This place was much more picturesque—it would make a fine place to die, I mused. If death was to claim me, I’d not go without a fight, nor my poorly timed sense of humor, not even terror could tear that away from me.

  I was about to give up all hope, my body too fatigued, when I spied a crumbling building in the distance; I’d have to break through the wall I’d hit, but if I could just make it until there, maybe I’d be able to hide.

  I’d trained myself with weapons out of necessity, but fighting was always a skill I fell back on only when I knew I could win. Even if I found an arsenal in there, I didn’t think it would be enough to make it out alive, not on my own.

  Not for the first time since sprinting for my life, a pang of loneliness hit me as I thought of the team I’d once worked with. I’d been keen to keep my distance, to maintain my identity as a loner, yet now I’d have given anything for one of them to be by my side.

  Irony tasted bitter.

  “Please, don’t let today be the day,” I breathed, the reality of my situation growing bleaker in spite of the building I had locked in my sights.

  As I slammed my shoes further into the ground, attempting to push off harder and faster with each footfall, the smell of salt filled the air.

  The ocean. The thought of being trapped against a wall of water, however tranquil it may look, wasn’t comforting; if the building failed to protect me, I had no other escape route out of here.

  I could wade into the water and try to swim, but without any idea of where the waves would carry me, the idea was a foolhardy one I’d use only as a last resort.

  Behind me, more shrieks exploded from the throats of the ravenous horde.

  At last, the entrance to the structure was within my grasp—a couple more pounding steps and I’d be through its doorway and into safety.

  I hoped.

  Barreling through the opening, I couldn’t help but take note of the blackened edges of the frame, as if someone, or something, had fired explosives to force it open.

  What had gone on here?

  “Arrrgggh!” My screams pierced the room, my eyes widening with terror as I skidded to a halt in front of three unmoving mountains, their expressions just as shocked as mine.

  I’d never seen anything like them before, man or beast: they were massive, easily over six foot, their bodies tight with muscles.

  And the horns.

  Horns.

  They twisted out above their heads, each one of them possessing a slightly different display. While one of them had dark horns which pointed straight up, another had ones lighter in tone protruding outwards to the side. The last of the group, I noticed, was missing one of his horns, with only a rugged stump next to the one that remained strong and proud.

  They were awesome to behold.

  And terrifying.

  It felt like I had been standing paralyzed, staring at them for hours, but as the commotion outside increased to signal the arrival of my impending demise, I realized that mere seconds had ticked by.

  Frightened and overwhelmed, I froze in place, unable to will myself to move out of sight.

  The three I’d interrupted mobilized into action, dividing into a perfect formation, one headed directly for the door while the other two came in on either side.

  One of my attackers jumped through the door, met by a set of charging horns, tips easily piercing the flesh of its throat.

  Liquid splattered the room in a shower of blood, though it wasn’t of a color I’d seen before; these monsters ran as yellow as their teeth. It was like watching pus ooze out of them. I held back from gagging as I watched more of the stuff hit the floor and the doorway.

  Scrambling, I fell in a tangle of limbs in the far corner, unable to look away.

  Once the first of the pack was dealt with, its body twitching out its last on the floor, it didn’t take long to dispatch the remaining four; two met a fate similar to their alpha, while the others turned on their tails and ran.

  The horned aliens must have felt them no longer a threat. No sooner had the beasts retreated, the trio’s gazes fell back onto me.

  I gulped as they watched, though I didn’t feel threatened by them. Despite their size and the sense of foreboding they commanded, they’d saved me.

  “T-thank you,” I mumbled, my cheeks heating with embarrassment.

  Aliens.

  Alien planet.

  They weren’t going to understand a word I said.

  My gaze fell to the floor, but the bodies of the creatures swam before me, and I looked away quickly.

  The aliens were much more interesting, anyway.

  None of them spoke but instead they exchanged a quick, unfathomable look. The one missing a horn separated from the group and stepped towards me, stretching a hand down to help me up.

  I nervously slid my hand into his; it looked dwarfed in comparison, my pale flesh light against the greyish hue of their skin. Straightening up onto my feet, he returned to his companions while I dusted myself off, a poor attempt to try and look presentable.

  First impressions were important when meeting new people, right?

  Especially entirely new species?

  “Roth,” he said to me, giving me a reason to stop dithering about my appearance and to look back at the three of them.

  His hand was pointed towards himself by way of an introduction, or so I assumed. I nodded and repeated his name back, to show that I’d understood; the briefest of smiles crossed his lips.

  “Kern and Talos.” His fingers pointed from the one with the straight up horns, which I now knew to be Kern, and then to Talos, the one with the horns that stuck out a bit sideways.

  “Roth, Kern, and Talos,” I said, pointing as I went. Each of them bowed their head a little when I called their names, a sign I’d gotten it right. Given how far away from home I was, I was relieved that we’d progressed this far in such a short amount of time.

  Funny how my first interaction with aliens was going smoother than most of my relationships
I’d experienced since birth! Turning the attention to myself now, both my hands pointing inwardly, I spoke my name. “Erin. I’m a human. Erin.”

  “Er-rin,” Roth replied, his pronunciation a little stilted but otherwise correct.

  Now the room fell silent again, similar to how it had when I’d screamed my way through the door. I couldn’t begin to know what they were thinking, but I was curious as to how they’d been able to understand me.

  Had they?

  Roth

  I was alive.

  There was nothing quite like the blood of one’s enemies to renew the vibrancy of the world. I felt it deep in my bones, that surge of energy as adrenaline rushed through my veins, my muscles taut and ready to unleash hell. Even my remaining horn throbbed with desire for more brutality, that sweet release of combat something without a match in the whole universe.

  I was made for this.

  The most fiery pits of the hells I’d experience must have shaped me, as my lust for battle, to be the victor over a sea of dying enemies, was unlike any pleasure this world could gift me.

  “Where are we?” The woman’s voice was soft, but it forced me to pay attention. Underneath the anxiety in her words was something I recognized as courage.

  She was helpless, but not hopeless. I approved.

  I took one more careful step toward her, and she held her breath. I watched the rise and fall of her chest halt, her lips tightly pursed as nervously, she pushed a stray lock of hair away from her face, her golden brown eyes locked on mine.